Prep Softball: Milledgeville gets even, takes NUIC-East lead

DAKOTA — Milledgeville took advantage of Dakota’s poor defensive play and all-state senior ace Emily Bush managed to work her way out of jams as the Missiles exacted revenge for their only conference loss in a 6-3 triumph Tuesday over the Indians.

DAKOTA — Milledgeville took advantage of Dakota’s poor defensive play and all-state senior ace Emily Bush managed to work her way out of jams as the Missiles exacted revenge for their only conference loss in a 6-3 triumph Tuesday over the Indians.

Milledgeville (18-3, 9-1), which lost to Dakota 13-0 in the two teams’ first meeting, now has sole possession of first place in the NUIC-East.

“We’re a much better team than when we played them the first time,” Bush said. “We knew we had to come out and play like we can play.”

The Missiles plated four unearned runs in a five-run fifth inning to put the Indians in a 6-0 hole as the Indians (10-4, 7-2) made some costly mistakes on defense, making their three late runs meaniningless.

“That was the name of the game; we had a bad defensive inning that led to five runs,” Dakota coach Jeff Kinney said. “The positive message we take out of it is if we play a better defensive game, we’ve got them at bay and those three runs mean something.”

Three of the five Missile runs in the fifth came after two were out.

“Even when there are two outs you’ve got to know to keep playing and we kept playing hard. Once one hit came, another came,” Milledgeville junior second baseman Taylor Grenoble said. “We just picked each other up and we took advantage of the errors.”

The Indians had plenty of chances to score off of Bush early in the game. They loaded the bases in the first and third innings and had runners at second and third with two out in the fourth, but each time failed to score.

“It seemed like there were always girls on second and third with one out or two outs and (Emily) would pitch her way out of it,” Milledgeville coach Brad Grenoble said.

Bush struck out Eden Meier to leave the bases jammed in the first, then got Meier to pop out with the bases packed in the third. She induced an Amber Jones groundout to get out of a second and third, two-out jam in the fourth and struck out Kendalynn Rockey to leave a Dakota runner at second in the fifth.

Bush stranded a total of 11 Dakota runners, eight of them in scoring position.

“Since I first started pitching that’s something I’ve been good at is focusing and bearing down and being able to get out of tough situations,” Bush said.

“She’s not afraid,” Kinney said. “She’s going to make you hit her pitch and she’s got the confidence to get that big strikeout our produce weak contact.”

Bush gave up 11 hits and two walks, but struck out 14. Dakota’s two runs came on a Kristi Ebbers’s two-run homer to left in the fifth and an Olivia Zimmerman RBI double in the sixth.

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Zimmerman was the hard-luck loser for the Indians. The sophomore gave up just one earned run, six hits, one walk and struck out eight. The Missiles are the No. 1 seed and Dakota the No. 2 in the Class 1A Aquin Regional.

“We know that the first game when we got good defense and good pitching we kept them at zero, so if we if get the good pitching effort again, play good defense then all we’ve got to do is come up with a big hit here or there and make the play,” Kinney said.